Bike Locker Space is nearly 6X as costly as Car Parking Space

If WMATA increases the bike locker fee to $200 a year it will then be nearly six times more expensive to park a bike per square foot than to park a car. Car parking for the year is $660. But, as pointed out in the brochure of the company who makes the bike locker

you can fit nine of our bike lockers in one car parking space – that’s enough parking to hold eighteen bikes.

So that same parking space could generate $3600year if dedicated to bike lockers. Even at the old price WMATA was making a killing of $1260 per car parking space. Metro is not considering raising the price of automobile parking I should note.

Again, I support performance parking for bike lockers, but that involves actually knowing which lockers are being used and which are not. Where there is a waiting list, raise prices gradually, and use some of the new revenue to install more bike lockers or double-tiered ones at places like Eastern Market where there’s a waiting list. Where there is no waiting list, lower prices.